This topic contains the following information:

• Payroll Record Exceptions for Public Works — Contractors and Subcontractors
• Payroll Records Exception for Janitorial Workers
• Hours Exceptions for Pharmacies
• Hours Exceptions for Railroads
• Hours Exceptions for Smelters
• Hours Exceptions for Agricultural Processing

Payroll Record Exceptions for Public Works - Contractors and Subcontractors

Each contractor and subcontractor engaged in public works is required to keep accurate payroll records that show the employee’s name, address, Social Security number (SSN), work classification and straight-time and overtime hours worked each day and each week.1 These records must also show the actual per diem wages paid to each journeyman, apprentice, worker or other employee employed by the contractor or subcontractor in connection with any public works project.

The payroll records must be certified and available for inspection at all reasonable hours at the principal office of the contractor upon request by an employee or their representative, the body awarding the contract or the DLSE. Contractors or subcontractors must file a certified copy of the record with the entity that requested the records within 10 days after receipt of a written request.

The public does not have access to records at the contractor’s principal office, but rather through the body awarding the contract or through the DLSE. The individual employee’s name, address and SSN are not available to the general public.

The payroll records must be provided to the Labor Commissioner at least once every 30 days while the work is being performed and within 30 days after the final day of work performed and must be provided in an electronic format prescribed by the Labor Commissioner.2 Contractors that fail to provide the payroll records as required are subject to a penalty by the Labor Commissioner of $100 per day, not to exceed a total of $5,000.

Payroll Records Exception for Janitorial Workers

Covered janitorial employers must keep accurate records of daily hours worked, start and stop times, wages paid each payroll period, ages of minor employees and other required information. Records must be maintained for three years. For more information, see ”Requirements for Janitorial Workers” in Wage and Hour Requirements for Specific Industries.

Hours Exceptions for Pharmacies

People employed to sell retail drugs and medicines or to compound physicians’ prescriptions cannot work at the store, pharmacy, dispensary or laboratory more than an average of nine hours per day, more than 108 hours in any two consecutive weeks or more than 12 days in any two consecutive weeks.3

Pharmacists are not exempt from overtime, unless they individually meet the tests for either the executive or administrative exemptions.4

California law prohibits chain community pharmacies from establishing quotas, defined as a fixed number or formula related to the following duties performed by pharmacists or pharmacy technicians:

• Prescriptions filled.
• Services rendered to patients.
• Programs offered to patients.
• Revenue obtained.

For purposes of this law, “quota” does not mean any of the following:

• A measurement of the revenue earned by a particular licensed chain community pharmacy not calculated in relation to, or measured by, the tasks performed, or services provided by, individual pharmacists or pharmacy technicians.
• Any evaluation or measurement of the competence, performance, or quality of care provided to patients of a pharmacist or pharmacy technician if the evaluation does not use quotas.
• Any performance metric required by state or federal regulators that does not use quotas.

The law doesn’t prohibit a chain community pharmacy from establishing policies and procedures that assist in assessing the competency and performance of a pharmacist or pharmacy technician in providing care to patients if the measurements used are not, or do not include, quotas.

Hours Exceptions for Railroads

No train crew member can work more than 12 continuous hours, after which they are required to be off duty for at least 10 consecutive hours.5 Any train crew member who has been on duty for 12 hours in the aggregate within a 24-hour period is required to take off eight consecutive hours before returning to duty.6 Exceptions to these limits include emergencies that could not have been foreseen.7

Hours Exceptions for Smelters

Employment periods for employees working in smelters and underground mines cannot cannot exceed eight hours within any 24-hour period, excluding meals.8 However, you can allow your employees to vote to exceed eight hours in a 24-hour period. This vote requires a two-thirds majority, a secret ballot, certain advance notice to employees and informational meetings.9

The limitation on hours worked doesn't apply if an employer and a labor organization that represents employees have entered into a valid collective bargaining agreement that pertains to wages and work hours.10

Hours Exceptions for Agricultural Processing

Under three of the Wage Orders — Wage Order 3 (Canning, Freezing and Preserving); Wage Order 8 (Industries Handling Products After Harvest); and Wage Order 13 (Industries Preparing Agricultural Products for Market, On the Farm) — employers can exclude from hours worked recess periods of 30 minutes or more, other than a meal period. To do so, all the following conditions must be met:

• You must notify the employee of the time to report back to work;
• The employee must be allowed to leave the premises;
• No more than two work recesses can occur on a single shift; and
• The total recess time does not exceed two hours long.11

1. Lab. Code sec. 1776